So you have a mechanically sound 3D printer, but
can’t get those layers to look more consistent? Then you need to try one slicer setting
that will truly do wonders. And no this is not a bait! I have tested this with PLA and ABS
filaments on multiple printers! So let's reveal probably the least intuitive slicer setting
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Before you apply the setting that truly makes wonders, first you must know the other
two main factors that can significantly add up to this inconsistency. You might think
that our extruders have surgical precision, but in reality, they just DO NOT.
Even the most common extruder design that has dual drive gears pushing the filament has
a fundamental issue of those gears never meshing perfectly. That will lead to less consistent
extrusion compared to the single-drive gears.
This is nothing new and lately,
we started to see the glimpses of these types of extruders coming back to the
marker. Prusa MK4 uses a single drive gear, Bambu Lab A1 series uses a single gear,
and you can even print and make one from a kit as a standalone extruder or
drop-in replacement for your Voron.
So, the improvement you will get with that
one magical slicer setting will depend on how consistently your printer can extrude the plastic
in the first place. But don’t get me wrong you will still see a noticeable difference even with
dual-gear extruders that has no glaring issues.
Another factor that will make your layer lines
less consistent is printing at different flow rates and speeds. The slower you print the
more time filament spends in the hotend. As plastics have a very low thermal conductivity
your extruded wall width will depend a lot on how long the filament spent in the hotend. To
better show this effect I created a test print.
It has two slots where no infill will be
printed. This means that we’ll be slowly printing bridges. That will lead to the filament
spending more time in the hotend and being heated more. And after we are done bridge’ing, we
will be printing perimeters of the next layer with way more heated filament resulting in
slightly bulged and more shiny layer lines.
This is probably the least explored aspect of why
prints have inconsistent layers. The only way to combat this, that I know, is to have high flow
hotend, print slow with the same speeds across all features, and travel as fast as possible.
So with all this out of the way, the one setting that will give an insane quality boost to
your prints is printing the outer walls first, before the inner ones are printed. You might
be very skeptical about this because of the overhangs, but this is where your mind
might be blown for the second time.
In the Orca Slicer 2.0, for all my print
comparisons I used the inner/outer/inner wall ordering option. In my opinion, this is
the best order, as when we slowly print bridges, it will first print the inner walls to flush
that hotter filament, then print the outer one, and finally finish the last inner wall.
The only additional setting that you might look into is the Travel Distance Threshold. In this
case, it will eliminate unnecessary retractions and z-hops when we only need to travel just a
bit longer distance to print that outer wall.
So now let’s dive into the comparisons. I
started testing with a printer that has a dual-drive gear extruder. The first thing I did
on all the printers was to calibrate the flow rate for the printing speeds I would use. In the
beginning, I tested printing inner walls first with the Precise Wall option in the Orca Slicer.
What this option does is it prints the outer wall without squishing into the inner one. This leads
to a small improvement on my fully modded KP3S PRO printer, but it comes nowhere even close
to what improvement we get when printing the outer wall first. I also tried combining
the outer wall and precise wall option but as expected there was no improvement
in the layer consistency of the print.
Next, I ran the same test print on the
Bambu Lab A1 which has a single filament drive gear. Before we look into comparisons
between two printers it is good to see how extrusion consistency looks when comparing
two tested extruder types. Like I said before, a properly functioning dual-drive extruder is good
enough but as you can see the single-drive gear results are just objectively more consistent.
When printing the inner walls first, the A1 prints look almost as nice as with the dual-gear
extruder when printing the outer walls first.
The Precise wall option with A1 made
a small improvement, but yet again the difference that printing the outer wall first
makes is just on a completely different level and the print looks almost flawless.
Well, that’s great, but I think all of us want to know how this setting performs with
overhangs. Well… With my designed cooling test print literally every print from PLA surpassed
all of my expectations. It seems that printing outer walls first can result in worse overhangs
only at extreme angles. But it will also depend on your cooling setup, as my fully modded KP3S PRO
performed just as well at those extreme angles.
You might think that this is a very forgiving test
print but I rest assured that it is not and many of the stock consumer 3D printers struggle a
lot as their cooling is just not that good.
While with more organic prints the layer
consistency improvement will be very minimal, in some areas I saw better overhangs by
printing the outer wall first. I know, it just feels like it makes no sense, but all my
test prints from PLA were so much better looking and I had no problems printing overhangs. Not to
mention that printing the outer walls first will make your practical parts fit perfectly.
This leads to the question of how this one setting works when printing ABS. This is
where your mind will be blown even more. The results with Bambu X1C felt completely
absurd as higher overhangs looked so much better with printing the outer wall first.
Surely it is just a fluke… Right?! So I switched to another brand ASA filament and a
more budget QIDI Q1 PRO printer. But nothing changed. When printing the outer walls first it
gave a print that is just on a different level when it comes to the layer consistency and the
overhangs continued to be better compared to when printing the inner walls first.
I printed and compared more things like this USB cable holder or a way more
complex Voron part that yet again had an insane improvement in print quality.
I also tested on more printers and this made me realize that even I and 75% of you,
are missing out on something incredible.
From my testing, this option not only makes
wonders to layer consistency in your prints, but I didn’t even find any significant downsides
when printing overhangs and in some cases, they even can become better.
Plus it also gives you way better tolerances for all of your practical prints.
So give this setting a try, especially as making quick comparison prints is very easy to do in Orca
Slicer. All you have to do is go from the Global tab into the Objects, select the print, and
choose the different wall ordering option.
You can post your prints and with what
3D printer you made them on Twitter, as it will be interesting to see what
your experience is with all this.
If you have discovered any similar settings
that make significant improvements to the print quality, make sure to share them
in the comments below. Great suggestions sooner or later will turn into a video to
make more people aware of that good stuff.
Huge thanks to everyone who supports
my work on Patreon and YouTube.
Well, that is all from me
and I will see you next time.
